Internal Revenue Service Director of Exempt Organizations Lois Lerner leaves a hearing of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee after refusing to testify May 22. Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images.

House Ways and Means chairman Rep. Dave Camp vowed that “there will be consequences” after revealing secret emails that embattled Washington-based IRS official Lois Lerner sent to her colleagues suggesting collusion between the IRS and Democratic operatives and claiming that tea party applications should not be processed through the agency’s Cincinnati office.

“Tea Party Matter very dangerous… Counsel and Judy Kindell need to be in on this one… Cincy should probably NOT have these cases,” Lerner said in a February 2011 email, despite the fact that IRS officials initially claimed that the agency’s Cincinnati office was solely responsible for the improper targeting of tea party and conservative groups.

“Perhaps the FEC will save the day,” Lerner said in an email, responding to a complaint the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee registered with the Federal Elections Commission. The IRS and FEC reportedly collaborated on conservative targeting.

“There is increasing and overwhelming evidence that Lois Lerner and high-level IRS employees in Washington were abusing their power to prevent conservative groups from organizing and carrying out their missions. There are still mountains of documents to go through, but it is clear the IRS is out of control and there will be consequences,” Camp said.

“We have been regularly providing witnesses and requested documents to Congress, including the emails released today. In addition, we continue to take corrective actions to fix the managerial and organizational deficiencies in the tax-exempt area identified in the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration’s May report.We support a complete review of these documents to fully understand the circumstances that led to these events,” the IRS said in a statement.